As you might have seen from my reading list for this week, I'm going to power through a lot of Donald Revell! Am nearly finished with A Thief of Strings, and it's blowing my clogs off!

And I had to share:

ME

Once, when I was in kindergarten, we had to fill out this little questionnaire that would accompany some kid-art we made. This was probably for open house or something. Anyway, when I got to the field for "eye-color," I turned to the nearest stay-at-home-mom-classroom-volunteer in panic.

"What color are your eyes, Diana?"

"I don't know!" The mom hands me a mirror and told me to look around my pupil. I feel triumphant in my seeing.

"Well, what color are they?"

I reply, "Black!" The mom laughs and tells me to look again. And I'm confused as to why she's laughing because all I see are black inky pools staring back at me from the surface of the mirror.

DONALD REVELL

"The Wisdoms"

It was now late; Goethe gave me his dear hand, and I departed.

--Johann Peter Eckermann

What happened? I was one

Gladly suffered the believing I am I.

A cut tree weeps a stream of ants from its wounds.

Not too feet away, sage and verbena thrive

In a cascade of blue differences

Over the lizards and dirt.

La di da. To matter to me,

Time was, a man or woman had to love me.

That was America.

That was a chief concern.

What happened is my eyes have no color.

I love the way a flower steps away

From a dead tree.

Broken glass is alive, too

In the colors. In them, I was a republic.

Meanwhile, the last time I visited JB's parents' house, I found this picture. Even as an adult, I don't truly know what hazel as an eye color really is. And I've looked into JB's eyes many times. Thanks, Wikipedia!